Letters

Mayor Chris Fiore’s wetlands clearing is relevant [“Park Fight Gets Personal in North Haven as Critic Charges Mayor With Overclearing His Own Property,” 27east.com, August 29].

Clearly visible on Google Maps is an approximately 4,000-square-foot section of “missing” wetlands buffer between Mayor Fiore’s house and a large freshwater pond. It’s the only spot of wetlands clearing in the “greenbelt” that connects North Haven’s large Gannet and Mashomuck estuary systems.

I believe this is relevant because some of the decisions so far on Lovelady Park have seemed more like backyard impulse than environmentally sensitive planning.

Last week’s Community Preservation Fund public forum on Lovelady was standing room only. Residents voiced their concerns about an overly manicured park in this wild part of North Haven.

The mayor’s own 2016 North Haven Planning Board approval required that a large, previously cleared pondside area be allowed to grow out with no disturbance whatsoever. Seven years later, the new buffer area should have grown out to look like the wild wetland shrub areas bordering it on either side along the pond. But comparing the Planning Board map to Google Maps, it’s obvious that it’s still cleared.

To make sure that Google Maps was not dated, I took an at-altitude drone photo, which confirmed missing buffer area.

At the Southampton CPF forum, Bob DeLuca from the Group for the East End laid out a framework that almost everyone in the room seemed to like. Planning, including environmental planning, as well as Southampton CPF oversight, should result in a park more consistent with North Haven’s rural character.

I am not upset by the mayor’s accusations that I “fabricated evidence” of his illegal clearing. Google Maps is not a fabrication. And Planning Board documents on file at Village Hall are not a fabrication.

Nor am I upset by his protesting my (expressly protected under New York State law) drone photo. Given that he does not know what day the photo was taken on, how could it have been bothersome?

Why can’t Mayor Fiore treat all this as a learning experience, pay whatever fines become due, let his required wetlands buffer grow out, and work in good faith with the helpful expertise and planning soon coming his way?

James Hayden Vos

North Haven